Suchergebnisse

"WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, AND IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH". The slogan from George Orwell's "1984" dystopia appears to capture the state of Russia's 2014 official discourse quite accurately. This has not gone unnoticed by public and academic spectators in and outside Russia: while Bild magazine is counting Putin's lies in his recent ARD interview, a Zeit article declares Russia itself to be a post-modern "lie".

"The paper critically addresses some of the existing theoretical gaps within constructivist norm research and proposes an analytical framework for capturing and analysing non-linear variation in states' normative positioning. The study then examines the various stances Russia has been selectively adopting in the process of its internalisation, contestation and revision of the international election observation norm throughout 2000-2012. The analysis reveals that until recently Russia had been primarily adopting a 'reformist' rather than 'revolutionary' stance, - only episodically questioning the norm's legitimacy and avoiding open violations -, and stresses the importance of non-material constraints on normative revisionism." (author's abstract)

In theoretical terms 'peace' remains a largely contested concept. Academics propose competing definitions and conceptualizations, which possess their own normative and analytical advantages or disadvantages. Yet despite heated academic and theoretical debates, studies looking at the empirical understandings of peace and conflict-settlement strategies of different states are largely missing. The paper set out to cover this gap and ask how similarities and differences in the actors' conceptual understandings of peace play themselves out in their agreement and disagreement over the advocated 'peace strategies'. Employing qualitative/ quantitative content analysis of the statements made by the representatives of the Russian Federation and the United States at the UN Security Council, Evgeniya Bakalova and Konstanze Jüngling analyze the debates around four recent and/ or ongoing conflicts (Georgia 2008, Libya 2011, Syria 2011-2014 and Ukraine 2014). The study reveals that while agreement over the conceptualization of peace does not impede further disagreement as to the advocated peace strategies, disagreement at the conceptual level breeds deeper disagreement.